My foot stands on a level place. In the congregations I will bless the Lord. (vs.12)
I waited patiently for the Lord, and He inclined to me and heard my cry. He brought me up out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay. He set my feet upon a rock making my steps firm. And He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Psalm 40
Ever lose your footing? I did last week. Slipped down a step on my front porch when I was washing it down barefoot. It wrenched my knee which still hurts enough that I am sitting here with heat on it while I type. To lose my spiritual footing in the past has been even more painful. No heating pad for that kind of aching.
When I was thirty-seven, my father was arrested while sitting in a car in a park molesting a thirteen-year-old boy from his church. My mother was dying of cancer at the time. I was there visiting them from a two hour drive away. My weekly visit to make bread and fix my mother's hair. The phone call from jail came after we had eaten lunch without Daddy, wondering where he could be. Mother did not want to go get him. Heartbroken and disgusted. We finally picked him up from jail, my handcuffed, shamed father. And all the way home he wailed: "I loved him. I loved him."
Mother died of her own volition that August. Just wanted to go home to escape the ignominy. There was no air for me to breathe, but I had three children and a husband. Cannot settle in to synthesize when life keeps barrelling forward. But I was bloodied in this battle. And the forging forth above the line of pain that ever ached and was exacerbated by the continued pedophilia of my father led me down a wrong way street. There I found myself, came to my senses, cried out from a horrible pit, stuck in miry clay from which I did not think I could ever be extricated. Wounds still bleeding from years before. Raw with anger. Alone in the dark.
"Jesus." Just a thought at first, so deep was I in the dungeon of my own making.
"Jesus..." Stronger now, hoping He would still listen to this wayward child of His covered in the sludge at the bottom of her cell.
"Jesus!" Louder. A tiny ray of light appearing through the darkness like a passage out of hell.
Then down He came. Into my prison. He did not stand up there at the rim looking down on me taunting with the words that I knew to be true: "You jumped in there all by yourself."
I was so filthy when He lifted me up. Unafraid of my besmirching His holiness, He carried me in His arms up the slippery walls I could not ascend. Gently, daily He washed me clean of the mire. Talked to me about forgiveness....made me forgive Him as He had already forgiven me. Can you see why I love Him so?
Eventually, my feet hit solid ground. No slipping from the residue of slime that had attached itself to my soles. No fear of the pit again. But a healthy recognition of how I got there and why I don't ever want to return. And...a new understanding of those who have lost their footing. Who need level ground. The hard work of going uphill to do the work toward a flat, even place. To undo the freefall when they raced to the bottom in their downhill flight and found that it was hell. No judgment from me these days. No, "I would never do that!" Nope. God showed me what I am made of without Him. And it ain't pretty.
I wake up with songs in the night now. New songs. My very own hymns of praise. Peons of joy. Why? Because finally I stand on a level place...a firm foundation built on my faith in Christ not on my faith in me. I know why I do not wobble now. I take heed of where I stand because I know that if I do not build on the foundation of faith in Him I will build on one that will crack.
So put me anywhere and I will tell of my God! My Savior. My Lord. A Lover of my soul who went to hell to get me out! I will sing of His love forever!
I waited patiently for the Lord, and He inclined to me and heard my cry. He brought me up out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay. He set my feet upon a rock making my steps firm. And He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Psalm 40
Ever lose your footing? I did last week. Slipped down a step on my front porch when I was washing it down barefoot. It wrenched my knee which still hurts enough that I am sitting here with heat on it while I type. To lose my spiritual footing in the past has been even more painful. No heating pad for that kind of aching.
When I was thirty-seven, my father was arrested while sitting in a car in a park molesting a thirteen-year-old boy from his church. My mother was dying of cancer at the time. I was there visiting them from a two hour drive away. My weekly visit to make bread and fix my mother's hair. The phone call from jail came after we had eaten lunch without Daddy, wondering where he could be. Mother did not want to go get him. Heartbroken and disgusted. We finally picked him up from jail, my handcuffed, shamed father. And all the way home he wailed: "I loved him. I loved him."
Mother died of her own volition that August. Just wanted to go home to escape the ignominy. There was no air for me to breathe, but I had three children and a husband. Cannot settle in to synthesize when life keeps barrelling forward. But I was bloodied in this battle. And the forging forth above the line of pain that ever ached and was exacerbated by the continued pedophilia of my father led me down a wrong way street. There I found myself, came to my senses, cried out from a horrible pit, stuck in miry clay from which I did not think I could ever be extricated. Wounds still bleeding from years before. Raw with anger. Alone in the dark.
"Jesus." Just a thought at first, so deep was I in the dungeon of my own making.
"Jesus..." Stronger now, hoping He would still listen to this wayward child of His covered in the sludge at the bottom of her cell.
"Jesus!" Louder. A tiny ray of light appearing through the darkness like a passage out of hell.
Then down He came. Into my prison. He did not stand up there at the rim looking down on me taunting with the words that I knew to be true: "You jumped in there all by yourself."
I was so filthy when He lifted me up. Unafraid of my besmirching His holiness, He carried me in His arms up the slippery walls I could not ascend. Gently, daily He washed me clean of the mire. Talked to me about forgiveness....made me forgive Him as He had already forgiven me. Can you see why I love Him so?
Eventually, my feet hit solid ground. No slipping from the residue of slime that had attached itself to my soles. No fear of the pit again. But a healthy recognition of how I got there and why I don't ever want to return. And...a new understanding of those who have lost their footing. Who need level ground. The hard work of going uphill to do the work toward a flat, even place. To undo the freefall when they raced to the bottom in their downhill flight and found that it was hell. No judgment from me these days. No, "I would never do that!" Nope. God showed me what I am made of without Him. And it ain't pretty.
I wake up with songs in the night now. New songs. My very own hymns of praise. Peons of joy. Why? Because finally I stand on a level place...a firm foundation built on my faith in Christ not on my faith in me. I know why I do not wobble now. I take heed of where I stand because I know that if I do not build on the foundation of faith in Him I will build on one that will crack.
So put me anywhere and I will tell of my God! My Savior. My Lord. A Lover of my soul who went to hell to get me out! I will sing of His love forever!
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